IntraVox: A Personalized Human Voice to Support Users with Complex Needs in Smart Homes

Abstract

We present IntraVox, a novel voice-based interaction system that supports users with complex needs by introducing a highly personalized, human voice command between smart home devices and sensors. Voice-enabled personal assistants (e.g., Amazon Alexa, Google Home) can be used to control smart home devices and increase the quality of life. However, people su↵ering from conditions such as dementia or learning disabilities and autism (LDA) can encounter verbal and memory problems in communicating with the assistants. IntraVox supports these users by verbally sending smart home control commands, based on the sensor data collected, to a voice-enabled personal assistant using a human voice. Over 12 months, we conducted 7 workshops and 9 interviews with 79 participants from multiple stakeholder categories -people with LDA, older and frail people, social and health care organisations. Results show that our solution has the potential to support people with complex needs and increase independence. Moreover, IntraVox could have the added value of reinforcing the learning of specific commands and making visible the inner workings of a home automation system, by giving users a clear cause-and-e↵ect explanation of why certain events occur.

How do interactive voice assistants build brands' loyalty?

“…Perceived irritation has been observed to negatively influence the mood, satisfaction, ease of use, word of mouth, return intention, and purchase behavior of online shoppers (Jere and Davis, 2011;Thota, 2012). Some users become annoyed when their voice assistants do not comprehend or respond to their voice commands (Salai et al, 2021).…”

Views and experiences on the use of voice assistants by family and professionals supporting people with cognitive impairments

“…The study had two stages: Stage 1 —a qualitative enquiry focusing on the first two aims presented above, and Stage 2 —the development and evaluation of a prototype addressing identified barriers in Stage 1, entitled IntraVox (Salai et al, 2021 ). Based on processing of smart home sensor data, IntraVox uses a personalised human voice to send prompts and reminders to end-users to conduct daily life activities, and to activate smart home processes using voice assistants.…”

“…Dementia is currently one of the major causes of disability and dependency amongst older adults that affects an individual's ability to interact with others and maintain a sense of self and identity (World Health Organization, 2022a ). People with dementia often experience difficulties in performing daily activities such as cooking, washing, maintaining personal hygiene, and using appliances and devices (Rosenberg and Nygard, 2011 ; Rosenberg et al, 2012 ; Salai et al, 2021 ). In other words, dementia affects all aspects of an individual's life (World Health Organization, 2022b ).…”

“…Voice assistants, such as Amazon's Alexa and Google Home, are the most used smart hubs available on the market and have been embraced by consumers across the globe (Juniper Research, 2017 ). These devices can bring a lot of benefits to consumers and, in the context of older people's care, are being promoted as technologies that can provide home support (Salai et al, 2021 ). For example, the voice assistants can help with controlling lighting, sending reminders to users to conduct several tasks, offer video calling functionalities, or provide cooking instructions.…”

“…No large-scale trials or project evaluations exist within the IoT literature (Brill et al, 2019 ), though there are studies that conclude that smart technology functions could potentially be used for health monitoring (Maguire et al, 2021 ). This paper presents the findings from further analysis of two studies: Study 1 —a qualitative study that aimed to explore the views and expectations of family carers and professionals who use voice assistants to support people at home who were living with a cognitive impairment, and Study 2 —a two stage study including a qualitative enquiry aiming to identify the purposes of using voice assistants by family carers of people with dementia and professionals in their caring role and the barriers they face when interacting with such devices, together with a pilot case study evaluating a smart technological prototype that addresses barriers identified during the enquiry, entitled IntraVox (Salai et al, 2021 ).…”